Compared to healthy adults, four times as many loose cells that slough off the inner lining of arteries, called endothelial cells, were found among heart attack patients who arrived at a hospital emergency room complaining of chest pain. A quicker and more efficient test is now being developed to count circulating endothelial cells in a blood sample.

Endothelial cells (green) found in the bloodstream of healthy people (left) differ from those taken from heart attack patients (right). The cells from heart attack patients tend to cluster and have multiple nuclei (shown in pink). Credit: S. Damani et al/Science Translational Medicine 2012

But even with the test, what would be the therapy? You may or may not be surprised at the answer – red wine molecules.

At least that is what researchers in Europe discovered about five years ago. Laboratory animals were subjected to a chemical (carbon tetrachloride) in their drinking water that induces an increase in circulating endothelial cells. Untreated healthy animals only had an average of 2.47 of these cells in their blood sample. Adding the chemical to their water increased the number of circulating endothelial cells by three-fold. Then the animals were given three weeks to recover, but time alone did not produce a decline in the number of these freely roaming cells. Three weeks of recovery plus the provision of red wine molecules significantly decreased their numbers in the blood (from 6.88 to 4.61 cells per milliliter).

Red wine molecules not only were effective after administering the chemical but also preventively, when given in drinking water prior to the caustic drug. The effect was more dramatic when given prior to the chemical.

Red wine pills are widely available in health food stores. Resveratrol is the best-studied red wine molecule, but it is not the only protective molecule in wine. Red wine pills that provide an array of protective molecules are more likely to produce the same protective effect seen in laboratory animals.